April Wrap-up: Classics Month Part 1

In the month of April I completed one of my first reading challenges that I had given myself, to read five classics during the month. I decided to read Moby Dick by Herman Melville, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum, The Inferno by Dante Alighieri, Winnie the Pooh by A. A. Milne and The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. I had read The Inferno and Winnie the Pooh previously and I wanted to read mostly classics that I had never read before. In May I will also be reading classics.

Moby Dick by Herman Melville- Read April 3rd- 25th

Rating: 📚📚📚

"I know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I'll go to it laughing." 

I had a hard time trying to figure out a rating for this novel when I had finished it. The overall story was interesting when the narrator, Ishmael, stuck to the actual plot. There were plenty of instances though that he would either get off track or would go into long flowery descriptions of whales that would last for a number of chapters. These described the use of blubber, how to dissect a whale, and many other descriptions of the anatomy of whales. 

The overall story focuses on a man named Ishmael who is telling his story of a whaling expedition that he was going on. What Ishmael does not know is that his captain's, Ahab, actual reason for wanting to go whaling. He wants to take revenge for the loss of his leg to the "Great White Whale." Ahab's obsession leads them on this voyage to go after the whale in a mission "to kill the beast." It is the story that many people know. I wish that Melville would have stayed on the actual plot more and I believe that it would have been so much better. That is my opinion though and I can see why this has become a classic but I did not like it as much as I wanted to. 

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum- Read April 8-9th

Rating: 📚📚📚📚

"Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain." 

Before I read this novel I had only known the story from the 1939 movie and the many television shows I have seen based off of the novel. The story is similar to the movie. A little girl named Dorothy is swept up in a tornado because she is not able to get out of the house in time. She lands in the house on a witch in Land of Oz. There she finds out from the Witch of the North (one of the differences between the movie and the novel) that she should go to the Wizard of Oz and he may help her get home. On the way to the Wizard she meets three characters: the Scarecrow, The Tinman, and the Cowardly Lion. Each has a reason to go and meet Oz. 

One of the differences that I was surprised about was the Wicked Witch of the West, who was one of my favorite characters in the movie. She is not in the novel that much and really is in the novel as comedic device. I did think that the witch was funny but this is one of the reasons that I did not love the novel. The Wicked Witch of the West has become one of the biggest and most known villains of time and I kind of wish that she had more of story in the novel. I loved her in the movie but I only liked her in the book. 

This novel was one that I have been wanting to read for a long time and I am glad that I read it. If you like the movie, I believe that you will enjoy the novel. It is interesting and a great piece of children's literature.  

The Inferno by Dante Alighieri- Read April 13th-18th 

Rating: 📚📚📚📚📚

"Abandon all hope ye who enter." 

This was the third time that I read The Inferno. I was first introduced to Dante's work in my senior year AP English class. I will always remember a classmate asking my teacher at the time why we were reading a book about Hell. He said that The Inferno was the most interesting out of Dante's Divine Comedy. It's ironic that the epic about Hell is considered by many as one of the most interesting. I cannot say anything to this because I have never read Purgatorio (Purgatory) or Paradiso (Heaven). I can say though that The Inferno is a carefully laid out piece that I enjoy wholeheartedly. 

Dante's Divine Comedy tells the tale of Dante's journey towards God and away from sin. The Inferno starts shortly before Good Friday and continues on until the morning of Easter Sunday. Dante is the narrator of the epic poem and it shows his trek throughout Hell with his guide Virgil (one of the most famous poets from Ancient Rome). He is being led away from sin by learning of the other sinners and of their punishments. Each of the punishments that Dante gave to the sinners in Hell are symbolic of the sins that they have committed on Earth. Dante divides it into nine Circles each getting worse as they go down. The first circle being the least and the ninth being the worst. 

He lays out his own idea of what he believes The Inferno would look like based on Catholic beliefs. Dante is believed to have invented the poetic form that he wrote in: terza rima. This is made up of stanzas with three lines each. The first and third lines in each of the stanzas rhyme while the second does not. The second line then will rhyme with the first and third line of the stanza after it. This type of rhyme scheme is meant to continue on throughout the whole poem until the end where the poet usually will end on a one line stanza to end the rhyme. Many of the English translations of The Inferno use this poetic form but many do not. I read a translation with the rhyme scheme. Being a poet myself I admire someone that can use a rhyme scheme like this and make it work well. The idea of three also goes along well with the other ideas of three throughout the epic: father, son, and the Holy Ghost; Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven; and the groupings of sin Incontinence, Violence, and Fraud represented by the three beasts at the beginning. Dante put a lot of thought and time into this piece and I cannot help but admire this carefully laid out epic. 

This is a challenging read but I would recommend reading it. There are many websites that can help out with understanding and many editions of the epic have little descriptions at the beginning of each of the Cantos (similar to chapters). Here is one of the websites that I have used in classes that are quite interesting: http://danteworlds.laits.utexas.edu/index2.html. I would recommend looking at this website after reading the Cantos. The information on this website is definitely a great addition to reading the epic. 

Winnie the Pooh by A. A. Milne- Read April 18th- 19th

Rating: 📚📚📚📚📚

I have already spoken on length about this novel. This was a great addition to the classics that I have read this month and I am very glad that I read this. Here is a link to my full review of the novel. http://whattoreadwithcag.blogspot.com/2017/04/winnie-pooh-by-aa-milne.html

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde - Read April 20th- 26th 
Rating: 📚📚📚📚📚

" 'Harry,' said Basil Hallward, looking him straight in the face, 'every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. It is not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on the colored canvas, reveals himself. The reason I will not exhibit this picture is that I am afraid that I have shown in it the secret of my own soul.' "

Dorian Gray is a self absorbed man who treats the ones that love and care about him horribly. He becomes completely enamored by a portrait of himself that his friend, Basil Hallward painted of him. After another friend, Lord Henry mentions that he will eventually lose his beauty he becomes obsessed with the idea of how the painting will never lose its beauty but he will. Dorian sells his soul so that he would never age as his portrait changes. Over time he changes into a man that only cares for himself and uses those around him. The portrait then starts to reflect the man he truly is, a corrupt man who is vain. 

It is interesting to watch Dorian's self destruction as he loses every bit of redeemable qualities that he once had. The story is slow at the beginning but it is completely worth getting through the first thirty or so pages. Dorian becomes a detestable man that it is hard to feel a bit sorry for him but his decline into narcissism is one of the most interesting stories I have ever read. I would recommend this book to anyone. His self-absorption in the fact that his beauty will eventually end is quite fascinating and I kept wondering what else this man would do. 

Oscar Wilde's discussion of the human mortality throughout the novel also kept me wanting to read. He has his character Lord Henry discuss this aspect to Dorian at the beginning of the novel. Dorian's own fear of his mortality causes him to destroy his many relationships and to destroy his own soul in the process. He wants his beauty to be immortal and this ruins him. His friends in the novel do not have many redeemable qualities themselves. They all state their interest in Dorian and their love for him though this love is because of how he looks. These characters show a shallow way of life that is very much similar to the characters that Jay Gatsby surrounds himself with in The Great Gatsby. This idea of mortality also reminds me of Shakespeare's Sonnet 18, where he shows how fleeting mortality really is. The idea that the picture really will live on after Dorian is similar to the idea of the Sonnet living on forever.